Sérgio Ferreira says that the €120,000 budget for the campaign to encourage registration for both the 2023 municipal and the 2024 European Parliament elections is ridiculous. Romain Gamba / Maison Moderne

Sérgio Ferreira says that the €120,000 budget for the campaign to encourage registration for both the 2023 municipal and the 2024 European Parliament elections is ridiculous.  Romain Gamba / Maison Moderne

ASTI’s Sérgio Ferreira says that although Luxembourg has finally ended years of discrimination by allowing all non-Luxembourg residents to vote in the 2023 local elections, actually getting them involved in politics is an altogether different challenge.

For more than 40 years, ASTI’s philosophy and action have been expressed in its slogan: “Living, working and deciding together.”

For 2023, the “deciding together” component will be more prominent, since there will be two elections: the communal ones on 11 June and the legislative ones on 8 October. For the purposes of this article, let’s forget the parliamentary elections… in any case, since more than half of the resident population will not participate, the “all” in this case is rather separate.

What interests us, then, is the local elections. In 2023 there is a major novelty: any resident foreign national, whether a citizen of the European Union or not, will be able to vote on 11 June. There are no other conditions. You just have to register by 5pm on 17 April, in the municipality where you reside or via Guichet.lu

The amendment of the electoral law, made last summer, puts an end to 30 years of discrimination. Since the 1992 Maastricht Treaty, Luxembourg has been the only EU country to impose a residency clause for EU citizens' participation in local elections. At the time, the fear of upheaval in the political landscape had caused the Luxembourg negotiators to fight for special protectionist provisions. A protectionism that took 30 years to be dismantled, despite the evidence, from the first elections with the participation of foreigners, that a different passport did not determine the meaning of the vote of the non-native voter.

Like many times in Luxembourg, we do better and worse than our neighbours. Worse, because we have imposed protectionist clauses that have been out of touch with reality for decades. Better, because Luxembourg does not distinguish between citizens of the European Union or citizens of third countries, in terms of the right to vote in local elections. That is, a Brazilian citizen or a Portuguese citizen can participate in exactly the same way, and that’s fine.

Getting citizens involved

But how can we encourage more non-Luxembourgers to register? There are no miracle solutions: we must communicate, communicate and communicate. It is just a pity that, in the draft budget for 2023, the ministry of family and integration grants the ridiculous amount of €120,000 for the campaign around registration for both the 2023 municipal and the 2024 European Parliament elections.

But it is not only the government that must assume its responsibilities. Political parties can also play a part, in particular by picking non-Luxembourg candidates in their lists. The example of the commitment of foreign candidates can have a multiplier effect among potential voters.

Bringing citizens in general closer to politics is not a simple task these days. The generalisation of antisystem discourse, the trivialisation of hate speech and the social and societal schisms favoured by (anti)social networks’ algorithms does not favour bringing citizens closer to the democratic process. For foreigners, reconciliation is even more difficult for various reasons. Failure to master the Luxembourg language (which has become the only language used in political debate over the past 20 years) is a difficulty that political parties must overcome.

The contradictory messages of the political world towards foreigners also play a fundamental role in this remoteness. If, in general, political actors tried to instill a sense of openness--the slogan “we are all in the same boat” during the pandemic is an example--the handling of explicit discrimination in the Luxembourg Constitution suggests quite the opposite.

“Luxembourgers are equal before the law” is now enshrined in the text, excluding foreigners from the principle of equality.

What is certain is that despite all the contradictions, we will continue to do everything so that the greatest number participate in the choices on our common future on which we must decide together!

Sérgio Ferreira, a former journalist for Portuguese-language broadcaster Radio Latina, is the political director and spokesperson of Asti, the association for the rights of immigrant workers in Luxembourg.

An alternate version of this article first appeared in the of Delano magazine.